“SEA AN 
pets at close range. At the end of a month each 
of the seals had gained three pounds. 
The male died very suddenly on the night of 
January 22. A post mortem examination made 
at the American Museum of Natural History, 
where the skin is to be mounted, revealed kidney 
disease as the cause of death. His weight, 
thirty-one pounds, taken at this time, showed 
that he had gained about seven pounds in the 
two months of his life at the Aquarium. 
The female, weighed at the end of the sec- 
ond month, showed an increase in weight of six 
pounds in the same period. At the present time 
she is apparently in the best of health, consum- 
ing her three pounds of fish at a meal in a man- 
ner to prove that she possesses a good appetite. 
Practically the whole day is spent in swimming 
and it is a delight to the eye to watch the active 
and graceful movements displayed as she swims 
about the tank or leaps upon the platform only 
to take another plunge. Her swimming move- 
ments are by far the most graceful of any ani- 
mal we have ever had on exhibition. The front 
flippers are used almost entirely in swimming. 
The stroke begins nearly at right angles with 
the body and the flippers are carried back along 
the sides and over the belly until they almost 
meet. The hind limbs serve for steering and in 
preserving the balance. Swimming on the back 
is the usual method, but this position is re- 
versed when coming to the surface to breathe. 
When resting at the surface the back is upper- 
most and the hind flippers are spread out to pre- 
serve the equilibrium, but when sleeping in the 
water the hind flippers are more or less doubled 
forward and the seal reposes on its side with the 
tip of the nose out of water, RAC O: 
ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY 
Sey 
EMONE 
Tage! bo 
sa catamarans 
LENS CABINET FOR VIEWING SMALL AQUATIC ANIMALS. 
BULLETIN. 
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! 
EXHIBITION OF 
SMALL ANIMALS. 
HE average individ- 
Ves possesses a deep 
and very natural in- 
terest, not to say curios- 
ity, in animals of unus- 
ual size, either very 
large or very small. The 
Zoological Park affords 
the means of satisfying 
this curiosity in regard 
to the larger animals in 
the living state, while 
certain of the larger 
forms of living fishes may be seen in the Aquar- 
ium. The American Museum of Natural His- 
tory and the Brooklyn Museum supply the de- 
sired information in regard to the larger forms 
by means of preserved material. The museums 
also haye attempted to satisfy the desire for 
knowledge of the smaller animals by the con- 
struction of enlarged models. 
It is but rarely, however, that the average 
person is able to obtain a view of these smaller 
animals alive, through a microscope or even a 
lens. For this reason the Aquarium has in- 
stalled a number of lens exhibits of small ani- 
mals. For a couple of years a single exhibit of 
mosquito larvae behind a large reading glass 
has been in operation and this attracted so much 
attention that the idea of exhibiting various 
forms of the smaller invertebrates in the same 
manner suggested itself. Accordingly, first 
one, and later four more exhibits were ar- 
